by Amanda Wills
But Sundays were sacrosanct. She lay in until half past seven - what luxury! - and had a leisurely breakfast before cycling over to the stables by nine o’clock so she had time to give Cassius’s tack a quick clean before she caught him and groomed him.
If she had time to ride in the week she was lucky if she spent more than ten minutes cleaning off the worst of the mud. But on Sundays Kristy groomed the Percheron from the tip of his smoky black ears to the bottom of his wavy tail, brushing his coat until it shone and oiling his hooves.
The four children took it in turns to choose a route then they disappeared for hours along the bridleways and lanes surrounding Mill Farm Stables. They rode in all weathers, from days when the ground was crisp with frost and their fingers and toes froze, to drizzly mornings when diaphanous rain coated their eyelashes with tiny beads of water. The only time they cancelled was in howling wind and horizontal rain.
‘Who’s choosing?’ said William, vaulting nimbly onto Copper’s back. Since the New Year’s Eve show he hadn’t been near the mounting block, choosing to hone his vaulting skills instead.
‘Me,’ said Sofia. ‘Sproggett’s Farm today, I think.’
Kristy grinned. It was her favourite ride, too. The route took them down pretty country lanes where, if they were lucky, buzzards wheeled overhead, into woodland. Then there was a long gallop along the side of an arable field before they passed Sproggett’s Farm and turned for home.
Emma appeared from the barn, a stepladder under her arm. ‘Have a good ride!’ she called.
‘We will,’ they chorused back.
The sun was shining in a bleached-blue sky and catkins hung from branches like tiny lambs’ tails. Spring was definitely just around the corner. Kristy slotted into her normal place next to Sofia and Jazz and they chatted about their week while the twins bickered amicably behind them.
Cassius could obviously smell spring in the air, too. He walked with a bounce to his stride, his ears pricked as he looked around him with his good eye.
‘He looks a million dollars,’ said Sofia.
‘That’s what Emma said.’ Kristy played with a hank of his mane and smiled down at Sofia. Secretly she loved the fact Cassius towered over the other ponies.
‘I bet his old owner wouldn’t recognise him,’ Sofia continued.
The smile slid from Kristy’s face. She didn’t like to be reminded that Cassius had been anyone’s except hers.
Two hours later they clip-clopped along the lane at the back of the stables. It had been an idyllic ride. The ponies and Cassius had behaved impeccably, the sun had felt warm on their backs and the twins hadn’t murdered each other.
Cassius stopped metres from the back gate, planting all four feet firmly on the asphalt. Kristy clicked her tongue. ‘Come on, Cass. Nearly home.’
But the black gelding wouldn’t take another step. His head shot up and he sniffed the wind with quivering nostrils. The ponies, picking up on his alarm, fidgeted on the spot.
‘What’s up?’ said Sofia, trying to calm a panicky Jazz.
‘No idea.’ Kristy kicked Cassius on but the Percheron, normally so willing, still wouldn’t budge. Kristy felt his body tremble as he gave a high-pitched whinny. She slid off and rubbed his blaze.
‘It’s alright, kiddo. There’s nothing to be frightened of, I promise.’
He lowered his head a fraction and she scratched his poll. ‘There you are, see? I’ll look after you.’
She clicked her tongue again and Cassius followed her reluctantly down the lane towards the gate. Kristy let the others through and closed it with a click.
‘I can hear something now,’ said William suddenly. ‘It sounds like a siren.’
Sure enough, the unmistakable wail of a siren cut through the air.
‘Perhaps there’s been a robbery!’ said William.
‘Don’t be stupid,’ said Norah. ‘What would they steal, pony nuts?’
The siren stopped and the four children looked at each other.
‘I hope there hasn’t been an accident.’ Kristy tugged Cassius’s reins and ran up the track that led past his paddock to the stable yard, the Percheron trotting obediently behind her.
She heard the low rumble of a diesel engine and saw blue lights reflected in a puddle of water outside the barn before she’d even turned the corner into the yard. She flung her reins at Sofia and sprinted towards the sound, her heart in her mouth.
5
Slave Labour
Kristy skidded to a halt. Two paramedics in forest-green shirts and cargo trousers were lifting a stretcher into the back of an ambulance. Kristy recognised the boots poking out from under the blanket immediately.
‘Emma!’ she cried, crossing the yard in a couple of strides.
Emma’s face was as white as wax and her eyes were slightly glazed, like an out-of-focus photograph.
Kristy peered at her anxiously. ‘What’s happened?’
‘She’s broken her arm. Fell off a stepladder,’ said the older of the paramedics. He placed a mask over Emma’s face and gave her a reassuring smile. ‘Gas and air. For the pain. Don’t worry, we’ll soon have you in hospital.’
Emma breathed in deeply and at once Kristy could see some of the tension leave her face. After a couple more deep breaths she took the mask from her face with her good hand.
‘Kristy, you need to phone Karen. Tell her what’s happened.’
‘Karen?’ Kristy couldn’t disguise her surprise. It was common knowledge Emma and her younger sister didn’t get on.
Emma grimaced and took another deep lungful of gas and air. ‘Yes, Karen. Tell her she needs to get her backside over here pronto.’
Emma must have noticed the look of alarm on Kristy’s face as her mouth twitched. ‘On second thoughts, don’t put it quite so bluntly. Ask her very nicely if she would look after the horses while I’m in hospital. Remind her she owes me for the time I looked after Coldblow for two weeks when she had her appendix out. Tell her I’ll be back in the morning.’
‘I’m not sure you will be,’ said the paramedic. ‘I reckon they’ll keep you in for at least a couple of days. It looks like a nasty break to me.’
Emma shook her head. The movement made her wince. She clutched Kristy’s hand. ‘Don’t tell her that, whatever you do.’
Kristy glanced over her shoulder. The others were standing a few metres away, shocked into silence.
‘There’s no need to ask Karen. We can look after the yard. I know what to do,’ she said in a rush.
‘I know you do, Kristy. But I have to have an adult in charge for the insurance. What if something happens and I’m not covered? I can’t take the risk.’ Emma’s voice was flat. ‘We have no choice. We have to ask my baby sister.’
The staccato sound of a car door slamming made Kristy’s heart sink. She had been mindlessly stuffing hay into haynets in the barn while the others changed rugs and filled water buckets. She dropped the haynet she was filling and trudged into the yard.
The phone call to Karen had gone as well as she had predicted.
‘She wants what?’ Karen had barked so loudly Kristy had snatched the phone away from her ear.
‘Just twenty four hours, Emma said. And,’ Kristy had taken a deep breath, ‘she said to remind you of the fortnight she helped you out after your operation.’
‘I bet she did,’ said Karen nastily.
‘Sorry. I did offer to do it,’ said Kristy in a small voice.
Her apology was met with silence. Kristy was beginning to wonder if Karen had hung up on her when there was a loud exclamation of breath.
‘I suppose I don’t have a choice. I’ll be over at four. You’ll have to make do without me until then.’
Kristy had filled in the others over a hot chocolate in the tack room.
‘She’s got a nerve,’ William huffed.
‘She has got her own riding stables to run,’ said Norah. Kristy remembered how impressed Norah had been when they’d recced Coldblow before the New Year�
�s Eve show.
‘She told us she’s got three other instructors, remember. Emma’s a one man band,’ said Sofia.
‘She has me, too. And I owe it to her to make sure there’s not a wisp of hay out of place when Karen arrives.’ Kristy drained her mug and stood up. She had thirteen horses to look after. She’d already told her parents she wouldn’t be home until at least six.
Sofia also jumped to her feet. ‘I’ll help. Anything to get me out of my history homework.’
‘We’ll help, too, won’t we Norah?’ said William.
Norah took their mugs. ‘I don’t mind doing Silver because he’s my pony. But I don’t get paid to muck out the others. Kristy does.’
‘Norah!’ said Sofia. ‘Not on a Sunday she doesn’t. And anyway, we’re doing this for Emma, not for Kristy. Emma works all day every day looking after our ponies. Helping her now is the least we can do.’
Kristy felt like hugging Sofia and was glad to see Norah had the grace to look a little shamefaced.
They divvied up the jobs and set to work. By three o’clock the thirteen stables had been mucked out and the paddocks had been poo-picked. Norah, who was complaining bitterly of an aching back and blistered hands, was tasked with mixing the evening feeds, following the set of instructions tacked to the wall of the feed room. William swept the yard with the yard brush he had used as a substitute pony when Copper was lame the previous winter. Sofia and Kristy brought in Cassius, Jigsaw and Mill Farm’s eleven liveries.
Kristy leant against Cassius’s stable door and the Percheron blew softly into her neck as she surveyed the yard.
‘I’d say that was a job well done,’ she said with satisfaction.
‘But it’s not exactly Coldblow, is it?’ said Sofia glumly.
Kristy pictured Karen’s magazine-perfect yard, where stablehands were bawled out if so much as a twist of shavings was out of place. At Mill Farm the concrete was crumbling in places and everything needed a lick of paint.
‘It isn’t,’ Kristy agreed. She snaked her arm around Cassius’s neck and lay her face against his cheek. ‘But at least the horses are happy.’
Karen stood beside her gleaming white Land Rover Sport with her hands on her hips and her mouth turned down. She consulted her mobile phone.
‘Which one of you is Emma’s stablehand?’
Kristy yelped as Norah gave her a shove in the back.
‘Me,’ she said reluctantly.
‘I’ve spoken to the hospital. She’s going to be in for at least four days.’
Kristy widened her eyes and crossed her fingers behind her back. ‘Is she?’ she squeaked.
‘So much for twenty four hours. So we need to get a few ground rules straight. I’m here in a supervisory capacity only. I won’t be getting my hands dirty. I presume you’ve finished evening stables?’
‘Yes, it’s all done.’
‘Well, that’s something, I suppose.’ Karen waved an arm at the boot of the Land Rover. ‘Perhaps you’d bring my luggage to the house.’
She stalked off towards the back door.
‘What did her last slave die of?’ William grumbled.
Kristy shrugged, opened the boot and reached for the matching suitcase and travel bag inside.
‘What are you doing that for?’ whispered Sofia. ‘She’s not your boss.’
‘I think it was a rhetorical question,’ said Kristy. ‘And anyway, she technically is. For the next few days anyway.’
‘Good luck with that,’ said William. ‘Come on Norah, we told Mum we’d be home by half four. He blew his unruly fringe out of his eyes. ‘See you at school.’
Kristy watched her three friends disappear down the driveway. She picked up the bags and trudged into the house.
Karen was in the kitchen, staring at the sink full of dirty crockery with a look of undisguised disdain.
‘I see my sister still lives by the same code as she always has.’
‘Code?’
‘Horses before housework.’ Karen picked up a yellow dishcloth with her thumb and forefinger and held it at arm’s length. She sniffed it gingerly and dropped it back onto the draining board with a shudder.
‘I suppose she hadn’t planned to break her arm today,’ said Kristy reasonably.
Karen gave her a tight smile. ‘I suppose not. Perhaps when you’ve carried my bags up to the spare room you’d like to wash up.’
It was another of those rhetorical questions, Kristy thought as she lugged Karen’s two bags up the stairs and along the landing to the biggest of Emma’s spare rooms. She must be so used to giving orders at Coldblow she’d forgotten how to ask nicely.
Karen was staring moodily at a collage of photos pinned to the cork board on the back of the kitchen door when Kristy reappeared.
‘I’ve made up the bed. And found you a couple of clean towels.’
Karen pointed to a photo in the centre of the board and stared at her appraisingly. ‘Was that you riding Arabella Hayward’s Percheron in the quadrille?’
‘I rode Cassius, yes. But he doesn’t belong to Arabella Hayward. He’s mine. I don’t even know who she is.’
‘She owns him. At least she used to. She used to box him over from Emma’s to Coldblow for lessons with me. Nice horse. I’m surprised she sold him.’
Kristy felt a tiny twist of fear deep in her stomach. She bent her head over the washing up bowl so Karen couldn’t see her face.
‘She didn’t sell him. She abandoned him,’ she mumbled.
‘I wouldn’t throw around allegations like that if I were you.’
Kristy picked up a saucepan and scrubbed at the congealed pasta sauce stuck to the bottom. ‘She did. She owed Emma six months in livery fees and a small fortune to the vet. Emma kept him in lieu of the money she was owed, and my friends clubbed together to buy him for me with their winnings from the quadrille.’ She dropped the pan on the draining board with a clatter.
Karen sucked her teeth. ‘That’s rather…unorthodox.’
Kristy swirled foamy water inside a tumbler. ‘So what do you do when someone doesn’t pay you?’
‘Take them to the small claims court, of course.’ Karen pointed a long-nailed index finger at a piece of dried tomato still stuck to the bottom of the saucepan. ‘You’ve missed a bit.’
6
Calling the Shots
‘She’s an absolute nightmare. All she does is order me about and then pick faults if my work isn’t perfect.’ Kristy slumped over her schoolbag. She knew she was being a drama queen but honestly, the others had no idea.
‘I got an earful last night because I left the tap running while I nipped into Copper’s stable to get his water bucket. OK so it made a small puddle. But it was hardly the Niagara Falls!’
Norah, who had summoned them to the library at morning break to hand out the new routine, tutted. But if Kristy thought she, too, disapproved of Karen’s exacting ways she was wrong.
‘She just has high standards. Think of it as valuable work experience. You’ll know what it’s like to work in a high-end yard. Let’s face it, Coldblow is a cut above Mill Farm.’
Indignation rose like bile in Kristy’s throat.
‘If you think she’s so great, perhaps you’d like to -’
‘At last!’ Norah said, as Sofia pushed open the library door, followed closely by William.
Kristy bit her lip. She hadn’t finished with Norah, but for now it would have to wait.
Once Sofia and William had settled opposite them, Norah pulled out four sheets of laminated paper from her bag. She flexed one experimentally.
‘I’ve laminated them so we can take them down to the stables and they won’t get ruined.’ She handed three to Kristy. ‘Take one and hand them round,’ she said bossily.
Kristy raised her eyebrows but did as she was told.
‘Initially, as you know, I was planning to move it up a gear and introduce some more advanced moves. Half-passes and flying changes, you know the sort of thing. But I had a long chat with
Emma before she broke her arm, and she said we’d be better off perfectly executing a simple routine than mucking up a more complex one.’
‘Actually, that’s what I said,’ said Sofia.
Norah ignored her. ‘I’ve left out the vaulting -’
‘There’s a surprise,’ William muttered. Vaulting wasn’t Norah’s strong point.
‘But I have introduced some new moves and we’re going to do some canter work, which should look really impressive.’ She looked at them all down her freckly nose. ‘If we get it right. So, please memorise the routine before our first practice ride at six tonight.’
‘Aren’t we having a walk-through first?’ Kristy was surprised. They’d walked their routine for the New Year’s Eve show several times before they’d tried riding it.
Norah waved her hand dismissively. ‘No time. We’ve only got a couple of weeks. It’ll be fine. As long as you’ve remembered it,’ she smiled thinly.
It was only as they reached the atrium, about to go their separate ways, that Sofia clutched Norah’s arm.
‘What about the music? The costumes?’
‘Don’t panic, it’s all sorted,’ said Norah serenely. ‘I’ve chosen a different piece of music by the same composer we used last time. It’s the perfect tempo. And we’re going to wear school uniform from the turn of the century. Pinafores and straw boaters -’
‘I am not wearing a pinafore!’ William exploded. A couple of Year Sevens loitering in front of the school hall nudged each other and giggled.
Norah shook her head. ‘If you’d just let me finish. Pinafores and boaters for the girls and shorts, a knitted tank top and a flat cap for you.’
Kristy felt anger flare inside her, like the flame of a candle caught in a draught of wind. ‘Seems like you’ve thought of everything. I’m amazed you even need us.’
Doubt clouded Norah’s face. ‘What do you mean?’
‘We’re a team, remember? You might be in charge, but sometimes it would be nice if you asked us before you decided what we’re doing.’
